Guides · PowerPoint and Microsoft Teams
If you present PowerPoint in a Microsoft Teams meeting from a laptop with one screen, there are three ways to keep your words in view. PowerPoint Live shows your speaker notes next to the slides. A slide show in a window leaves room for notes beside it. Or, on Windows, a teleprompter can float on top of the slide show. The first two use software you already have. Here is how each works and where each stops.
In the meeting, select Share, then choose your file under PowerPoint Live. From the PowerPoint app you can select Present in Teams instead. Your slides appear in the meeting with your notes next to them, and while you present you can see people’s videos, raised hands and reactions.
It suits notes of a few bullets a slide. The limits: the notes do not move with you, so you scroll them yourself, and they sit beside the slides, away from your camera. PowerPoint Live takes .pptx and .ppsx files. On a small screen, presenter view is hidden at first; turn it on with More options, then Show presenter view. People in the meeting can move through the slides on their own unless you select Turn off participant navigation.
This method comes from a presentation consultant’s guide for presenters with one screen (see the sources). In PowerPoint, open Set Up Slide Show and choose Browsed by an individual (window), so the show runs in a window instead of filling the screen. Save your notes pages as a PDF and open it beside the PowerPoint window. Start the show, and in Teams share only the PowerPoint window. You scroll the notes yourself.
The limits: the slides take part of your screen, the notes sit to one side so your eyes go sideways to read them, and you scroll by hand while you talk.
PowerPoint for Microsoft 365, on Windows and Mac, has a Teleprompter view in its recording window. It turns your notes into text at the top of the screen and can scroll them at a speed you set. It is for recording a presentation, not for presenting live in a meeting. If a recorded presentation would do, you may already have it.
This is what Terera is for. On Windows, it stays on top of a full-screen slide show, your clicks pass through it to the slides, and it follows your voice word by word. It waits when you pause, holds your place when you go off script to take a question, and resumes when you return to the script.
Hide from screen share asks Windows to leave Terera’s window out of captures. On Windows 10 version 2004 or later, and on Windows 11, Windows removes such a window from the capture; on older Windows 10 builds the capture shows a black rectangle where it is. Microsoft says plainly that this is not a security feature and comes with no guarantee. Screen-share hiding depends on the capture method your app uses, so check your sharing preview before a live call.
So test the exact arrangement you will use. Start a meeting with nobody else in it, join it from your phone with the sound off, share, and look at the phone. A rehearsal that finds a problem is the cheap kind.
Terera runs on Macs with macOS 15.5 or later, but its overlay on top of a slide show in full screen has so far been recorded only on Windows, so this page does not claim it for a Mac. Current macOS also lets many sharing tools capture Terera anyway, whatever its setting says. On a Mac, start with PowerPoint Live: Microsoft’s instructions for it apply to PowerPoint for Microsoft 365 for Mac too. Teams asks for permission to record your screen the first time you share. Screen-share hiding depends on the capture method your app uses, so check your sharing preview before a live call.
Terera
USD 89 once, tax included. Three of your own machines, Windows or Mac. Twelve months of updates, and the installed version keeps working after that. A 30-day refund by email. Speech recognition runs on your own computer.
Share with PowerPoint Live: in the meeting, select Share, then your file under PowerPoint Live, and your notes appear next to the slides. For a full script, run the slide show in a window with your notes beside it, or, on Windows, use a teleprompter such as Terera on top of the slide show.
It depends on what you share and how the meeting app captures it. On Windows, Terera’s Hide from screen share setting asks Windows to leave it out of captures; on a Mac, current macOS lets many sharing tools capture Terera anyway. Screen-share hiding depends on the capture method your app uses, so check your sharing preview before a live call.
PowerPoint for Microsoft 365, on Windows and Mac, has a Teleprompter view in its recording window, with auto-scroll. It is for recording a presentation, not for presenting live in a meeting.
Yes, on Windows. Click-through passes your clicks through Terera to the slide show, and it turns on when you enter the overlay. Ctrl+Alt+C switches it.
No. On Windows 10 version 2004 or later and on Windows 11, Windows removes the window from captures; on older Windows 10 builds the capture shows a black rectangle instead. Microsoft gives no guarantee. Screen-share hiding depends on the capture method your app uses, so check your sharing preview before a live call.
Related guides: a teleprompter for Microsoft Teams, reading a teleprompter without moving your eyes and Terera on Windows. What leaves your computer: Security. Compared with other teleprompters: the dated comparisons. All guides.